Moyers Continues Rant Against ALEC on Taxpayers’ Dollar

PBS Host Still Using Taxpayer-Funded Media to Fight Against ALEC

By

Mike Ciandella

June 25, 2013 - 6:38am

Bill Moyers may be a respected media veteran, but lately he
has also become a veteran of using his taxpayer-supported show to bash groups he
doesn’t like. And he does that while blatantly supporting groups he does like,
particularly ones on his payroll.

On June 21, show, “Moyers & Company” published a 56-minute
follow-up documentary in a series of attacks against the American Legislative
Exchange Council (ALEC). ALEC is a nonprofit forum where state legislators and
private sector leaders can share ideas.

The left has been targeting ALEC and its members for some
time. In March 2012, a group of liberal organizations including the Schumann
Center for Media and Democracy, the Center for Media and Democracy, the Center
for American Progress, People for the American Way, United Republic, Common
Cause and Color of Change, launched a campaign to pressure the corporations
that funded ALEC to withdraw their support.

Moyers heads the Schumann Center, which has given $1,360,000
to groups leading the attack on ALEC. That point was ignored in four stories
written about ALEC on Moyers’ website in 2012, even though Moyers has been
criticized for his connections in the past. Liberal billionaire George Soros
also donated more than $12 million to those same organizations.

The campaign against ALEC, dubbed “ALEC Exposed[1],” succeeded in
pressuring several ALEC donors to pull funding from the group, including Kraft,
McDonalds, PepsiCo and Coca-Cola. Moyers has continued to promote the work of other
groups bashing ALEC, through both the “Moyers & Company” website, and his
writing on liberal outlets like Alternet.

This second installment in “The
United States of ALEC[2]” repeated the same arguments brought up in the
first[3], with some new interviews with liberal types thrown in. These included
appearances by Chip Berlet of the liberal Political Research Associates (whom
Moyers describes as an “activist” who “studies the right wing movement”), John
Nichols of the liberal Soros-funded magazine The Nation and Lisa Graves of the
Center for Media and Democracy(CMD), which Moyers’ Schumann Center funds. Nichols
is also a major proponent of government-funded media.

Moyers began the documentary by warning about what he saw as
ALEC's agenda: “Privatizing America, one statehouse at a time.” “What's the
purpose of privatizing education in the United States?” asked Julie Underwood,
a dean at the University of Wisconsin. “Because there are some things in the
United States, like courts, legislatures, public education, that really, really
need to remain public. And that's the heart of what we are as a democracy.”

Moyers and the other liberals featured in the film implied that ALEC can
actually make laws, but this is not the case. “Through ALEC, you can change the
whole country without ever going to Washington, without ever having to go
through a congressional hearing, without ever having to lobby on Capitol Hill,
without ever having to talk to a president,” Nichols said in the introduction
to the documentary.

Of course, this statement was misleading at best. Nothing that
has come out of ALEC instantly became law. Rather, ALEC is a forum for
legislators to talk to leaders from the corporate sector about new ideas, which
are then submitted to be voted on in state governments. These bills then have
to go through the exact same process as any other bill before they can become
law.

To Moyers’ credit he did begin the documentary by disclosing
that the Center for Media and Democracy is funded by the Schumann Center. When
the crusade against ALEC began, Moyers made no
such concession.[4] On Oct. 4, 2012, billmoyers.com cited the work of the Schumann-funded Center for Media and Democracy, calling
it a “progressive watchdog group,” but again neglected to disclose the
connection between this group and Bill Moyers.

Moyers has hosted “Moyers & Company,” which is
distributed by American Public Media, since his return to the airwaves in
January 2012. Moyers had tried a brief retirement beginning in 2010.

As president of the Schumann Center,
Moyers has funded four of the groups involved in the attack on ALEC:

Center
for American Progress: $1,100,000

Center
for Media and Democracy: $250,000 since 2000 and $75,000 in the 90s

People
for the American Way: $10,000

The Schumann Center was also listed as a
foundation donor in Common Cause’s 2011 annual report, although the amount
of money given was unspecified.

The same four organizations that received funds from Moyers
have also received money from Soros’s Open Society Foundation since 2000,
totaling, $13,538,491:

Center
for American Progress: $5,784,991

People
for the American Way: $4,625,000

Common
Cause: $2,528,500

Color
of Change: $300,000

Center
for Media and Democracy: $300,000

The American Legislative Exchange Council is a non-profit
organization that promotes state-based policy initiatives. ALEC has been
heavily criticized by the left for its politically conservative stance on many
issues. Moyers, whom Common Cause called a “veteran journalist,” has been
instrumental in both funding and publicizing the attacks against the
conservative group ALEC.

The Society of
Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics[7] expressly states that
“journalists should avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived,” and that
they should “remain free of associations and activities that may compromise
integrity or damage credibility,” and, furthermore, that journalists should
“shun secondary employment, political involvement … if they compromise
journalistic integrity.”

Moyers is an outspoken liberal, and he has repeatedly used
his show to promote liberal causes and criticize conservatives. He even went so
far as to compare Occupiers to abolitionists and suffragettes. He has
also called
the National Rifle Association[8] “the enabler of death — paranoid,
delusional and as venomous as a
scorpion[9],” claiming that “[w]ith the weak-kneed acquiescence of our
politicians, the National Rifle Association has turned the Second Amendment of
the Constitution into a cruel and deadly hoax.”

Moyers may have once been a journalism icon, but he’s not
anymore. Now he’s an activist, with a taxpayer-funded platform to broadcast
from.

Federal employees and military personnel can donate to the Media Research Center through the Combined Federal Campaign or CFC. To donate to the MRC, use CFC #12489. Visit the CFC website for more information about giving opportunities in your workplace.